In the dim, silent corridor, the ghost that had stepped out of the Ghost Painting stood rigidly at the dormitory entrance, completely motionless, like a corpse that had stopped moving. It seemed to be waiting for its next victim after killing the person who had met its conditions, but for now, there was no new target.
The atmosphere at the scene was exceptionally tense.
Neither Wang Quan and the others nor Yang Jian spoke again.
They were all waiting.
Wang Quan was waiting for Yang Jian to act, while Yang Jian was waiting to see what the ghost would do.
With no certainty over which side was the source, the best approach for Yang Jian was to see whether the ghost would continue killing.
If it did, then the source of this incident was most likely not the Ghost Painting he was currently holding, but the ghost within it. The Ghost Painting might merely be a vessel, much like the face-covering cloth he had encountered before. There had been nothing wrong with the cloth itself; it was the bizarre crying face on it that had been the ghost.
Conversely, if it remained still as it was now, then the painting could be assumed to be the source, and he would not need to take action.
Besides that, Yang Jian had one more forceful measure available.
He could give up absolute control over the Ghost Shadow and free up a slot for suppressing ghosts, allowing him to deal with both the Ghost Painting and the ghost inside it at once.
But doing that carried risks.
Although the Ghost Shadow no longer risked reviving, its instinct to replace bodies remained. If, at the moment it touched the ghost, it replaced something on his body without permission, his balance would be ruined.
And